Hong Kong Baby!
29th May 2012 - Hong Kong (China)
Really enjoying Hong Kong and staying with a friends sister Angie and playing with my camera! :) :) also quite aware that the Asia leg of my trip is coming to an end. Quite scary but raaaather exciting. Also a little bit sad… Will miss a lot of things about you Asia!!
COME ONNN….
28th May 2012 - Window to the World, Shenzhen (China)
Went and chilled out in the park across the road, love doing that, people watching and laughing :) Last time in China before I go… Made best friends with the chefs in a hole in the wall restaurant making pork buns and dumplings. So much that they fed me up gooooood.
All over China when parents go to work their kids are being babysat by their grandparents, it’s so nice and makes for such tight knit families I’m sure. Here are some :) beautiful!
This is my hand, covered in people guessing how much I weighed. Thats right, I got asked if I weighed 180kgs…!!!!!!?!!!!!!!!!! HAAAAAHAHAHAHAHAHA WOW. Hahahahaha it was sooooooo funny, I cracked up laughing so we all did. Haha come on guys… Time to stop eating everything I see I suppose!!
Aloha!!!!
27th May 2012 - Window to the World, Shenzhen (China)
Something caught my eye on the map at the Windows of the World - the “Maorish Dwelling”. Made sure I caught a performance, these are a couple parts of it. Pretty funny stuff, I’ve no idea what they were saying and if they explained they’d taken a few parts from a few different cultures!!! Haha but it was lots of fun, they got up some people from the audience and got them to dance and do pukanas haha
Aloha!!! :)
Ticking off some sights!
27th May 2012 - Window to the World, Shenzhen (China)
Angkor Wat, Leaning Tower of Pisa and the Sydney Opera House and… Aloha? Haha
Window to the World
27th May 2012 - Window to the World, Shenzhen (China)
So today I went to the Window to the World… A theme park with miniature replicas of a whole lot of the natural and man made wonders all over the world and just some info about learning about different cultures around the world. The Maorish one was interesting…??!!! Haha see next post.
This crowd was standing watching a ride like along flume that came down and people got splashed up but luckily had all added the worlds pollution by buying a disposable poncho to wear. They would start taking the ponchos off because the ride was over but then you could ¥1 in little canon guns set up to hose them if you pushed it at the right moment! Hahaha. They would call out, hello!! And the people in the rides would wave and call hello back, and then get squirted in the face and soaked hahahaha! Look at them ALL cracking up, haha good one China :D :D
But I loved the camel the best haaaaahahahha!!! This photo cracks me up. If I had a phone with me it would be my screensaver, what a dick!! Hahaha I was just standing there looking at the camel thinking how funny it looks with that flower on its head and then I saw you could have a photo not with it but ON it. In DRESS UP!!!! Kurt says I have an issue with playing dress ups. Iiiii say, it’s the best $8 I ever spent. People were taking photos of me on their phones for their screensavers too haha, everyone wins!
Didn’t end up going to the night performance of the love story haha ohhwww missed out just because it rained and I wasn’t in the mood for an outdoor performance haha. Also because I have my new camera (!!!) to play with :) so I’m going home to muck around with that :) yay!
Hair Cut II
26th May 2012 - Shenzhen (China)
This is Eason. He cut my hair again. I liked the other cut but it was a little boring… So I walked into this place just for a look… And then Eason ended up shaving one side of my head haha. We’ll see!
There was about 12 hairdressers and washes and sweepers and they were all guys, the only girls were two on reception! They were lots of fun. When I decided to do it they all celebrated and began to guide me to seat 12. They all wear ear pieces and one brought his microphone close to the mouth and said, “number 12, number 12” in a low voice hahaha funny!
Not 100% on the cut just yet but kinda glad I didn’t let Eason give me a permanent perm! He said perms are realllllllly common in China - “Give body!” He says. He pointed out 8 of the 12 guys had different levels of perms! The Chinese aye!!
26th May 2012 - Shenzhen (China)
Interesting the different levels of communication within languages. You can have almost none - Dechang from the village in Guangzhou - and still be able to communicate amazingly. Or you can have HEAPS - the people in Sri Lanka speak English - but at times not be able to communicate the smallest of things or ask the smallest piece of information. Verrrrry interesting.
So I walked into a Canon store within the market and met Eddison (“but I am not Thomas Eddison!!” haaaaHahha) who within a minute became the love of my life haha prettttty much! He was so lovely and nice, attentive but not pushy, very good understanding of English but with a tuuurrible accent haha
I immediately liked him and then after TWO minutes I felt exactly like that lady that said to her husband about Mum, “I don’t know what spa I want but I just found the person I want to buy it off!”
He was so awesome and answered all my questions, I said, “But how do I know it’s realllll???” Sad face - life is so tough! “Oh!” he said, haha like, oh what a good question! Luckily I can answer it perfectly and make your day! Haha
“Our store is real! Not like the other stores, we have certificate from Canon, see! We are Canon store, we have Canon tub. (I’m sorry what?) Tub. TUB. Like this - tub!”
Ohhhh - STAMP. Ok yes. Hahaha
“And if you go, later you ask Canon and find not real… I will dead.” HAHAHAA!
Who cares if it’s not real! He’s hilarious!! Haha. If its all true it must be so hard to be in this market, flooded with fakes and second hand batteries…
Another salesperson came in and said something in Chinese to him, they laughed and he left and then Eddison told me he didn’t even know what he said. Haha! Then he cracked up again.
“And you pay cash please? PLEASE no credit card!” (and then in a lower voice with glazed eyes) “Pleease no credit card…” Hahahaha oh mannnnn.
We got interrupted again by another salesman, he asked if I was another customer that came in but I wasn’t. He said the guy asked Eddison to interpret but Eddison said no! Hahaha. Later when he gave me his card he said, and hey you can call if you ever have trouble here in China - I can be your interpreters!! Ohhhhh wow I love him!
Get. In. My. Pocket.
Train Trip
24th May 2012 - Hangzhou » Shenzhen (China)
Went on an overnight train from Hangzhou to Shenzhen, on the trains in China you can book into the very best - soft sleeper, hard sleeper, soft seats or the very worst - hard seats. Or there was a standing option haha! I panicked at the front of the line and my mandarin failed once she said the sleeper were sold out haha took a lucky dip from the most unhelpful attendant in the world and landed in hard seats - SURPRISE! Haha least it wasn’t standing…
Found my seat and once I’d kicked some guy out of it settled in for the 16 hour ride. Heaaaaaps of fun, apart from the no sleep it was an awesome trip and I’m glad she couldn’t speak English :)
Lots of questions in Mandarin for me to decipher… The best one was, “Why you no go to work?” Haha. Hmmmmm… And how do I say, I actually LOVE working!! My last job anyway…
The toilets weren’t fabulous but no problemo, love the squatting on days like this!! The people were awesome, offering food and taking care of my things for me.
They all loved looking through my photo album, and my notebook, and my scrapbook. Got my iPad out a bit later to write some and they loved playing on it. I left them playing mahjong on it while I went for a walk. People love to be offered trust. I’ve never lost one thing, had one thing stolen (famous last words) haha.
It might be because I’m always in the poorest places so the poor don’t steal off the poor - or go looking there haha. But I find the trick to just make best friends with those around you and then put all your trust in them. Ask them to hold your drink while you put your wallet away. Ask them to watch your bag when you go toilet. They take so much pride in your trust. It’s so nice to be able to give them that.
It might also be a case of, “Man oh man, would you look at how dumb this foreigner is. We better take care of her…” Haha! Whatever it is, it’s so nice and I so appreciate all my shit not being stolen :) :)
One lady had two little daughters with her, 3 and 6 years old. They were sooooo good the whole trip and she was such a lovely Mum. She said I was the first foreigner she’s ever met :)
There was one girl who was a possible prostitute haha she was lovely and bubbly and smily and easy… I asked what she did for work and she went a bit quiet and then my friend with a little English stood up for her and said she was just going to Shenzhen to “see” it…I said, “Oh you are a tourist! We are the same!” Haha. I asked her to write for me in my scrapbook and she wrote this… I got it translated later through google translate by a receptionist at the hotel I stayed at in Shenzhen, so cool. It says,
Joe:
The reason I want to talk to you in a football field, play a friendly ok? You and my eyes the same nice, I hope you like me happiness, beautiful New Zealand girl. Wishing you happiness.
Zhan Jiang Hu
Water Fountain Show :)
23rd May 2012 - Hangzhou (China)
Went to this water fountain show on the West Lake in Hangzhou, the waters shot up 126m at the highest! Doesn’t look that high but it was way out… You can see because it’s shot in towards the camera but doesn’t hit us. It was so packed, must be like that every night!! How sweet is the Titanic song aye, I was laughing cos I was tearing up hahaha
Went shopping afterwards and spent just under NZ $120 on a dress, skirt, top and shorts at a flash shop in a mall??! What the. Finally finding something, anything that could fit was good fun, and so cheap!! I felt like Relly haha
Was nice when I started back I looked at my watch and was surprised it was 11.30pm! Noticed some comfortable looking foreigners and asked if they lived here, they said yes so I asked if it was safe to walk back along the lake at this time. “Oh yes! Yes, yes, yes. They won’t even look at you!” and after thanking them, “No problem at all, please! Have fun!” Ohw, so nice! Wandered home and hardly even got looked at :) Kia Ora China :)
23rd May 2012 - Hangzhou (China)
Got up at 6am and put my cross trainers on for the first time in howwwww long? I read somewhere that the West Lake took about an hour to walk around slowly. Sweet! I thought, I can run that… Not so. And not because I’m DREADFULLY unfit…
Later I heard a receptionist telling someone that it takes 5 hours to walk right around!!! That’s an exaggeration… But I ran for half an hour and looked to be like a quarter of the way around haha so I took it down a level and power walked the rest and it took me three! One hour slow walking - whatever!!
But that was a good thing to misread, because the run was good. And the walk was awesome. It was so pretty!! Beautiful paving and green, green grass (that you’re not allowed on haha), super cute little flower beds and people!! Oh the people :) :) exercising, strolling, taking their grand kids for a walk, going to work, returning from work, just sitting and listening to everyone else. Groups dancing, sharing a cassette stereo. Others listening to their radios - tied into the baskets in front of their bikes, blasting a news station or whatever music takes their fancy, it’s loud enough for 30 people so you better like it too.
Where it was allowed, people were biking or on their scooters. There were several causeways and some had a series of little humped bridges, allowing the sightseeing and fishing boats to pass underneath. An old guy on a pushbike rode hard up to the bridge, dismounted at the perfect moment, walked about 8 steps to the brow of the hill and then got back on as quickly as he’d got off, off again :) and he watched me as I watched him, what a genius.
One guy was power walking and BELTING out a Chinese song, it was soooooo cool haha I heard him coming, thinking, what/who IS that… Then he came around the corner, arms out and mouth stretched wide haha he gave me a military nod as he passed, I expected him to execute a perfect round off as well haha what a star!!!
Another one came power walking up behind me and near yelled “HELLO!!” in my ear hahaha I don’t know how old he was, wish I asked him but he looked about 70, I think he put in a special effort to pass me but once he was past stayed in front about 10 meters, checking every now and then I was still there haha beautiful.
So enjoyed that.
I wanted to walk it again with my (broken) camera but it rained and poured both next days so I didn’t end up getting any photos :( oh well! In my head!
Custom High Tops - Yes Please!
22nd May 2012 - Hangzhou (China)
Super sweet aye!! Got them custom painted at Happy Valley in Shanghai! Wanted the background of one shoe and the flowers from another, but not that ugly kind of flower, just these ones… DONE! In an hour for NZ $60. Yesssss please! :)
Only thing was that I think my feet look big in them… It might just be cos I’m in China, or they might actually look like clowns shoes. Haha
Meeting Zhihua
22nd May 2012 - Hangzhou (China)
This is Zhihua, he has the most unreal voice and accent in the world. If I had a recorder in my pocket when I met him I would have pushed - RECORD - so you guys could hear him as well. It’s a cross between a BBC Newsreader and Gaston off Beauty and the Beast. He lived in Germany for 10 years and speaks German as well as a mother tongue!! But says his English is not good at all. He uses big words like economy and stylistic ha. Good enough for me!!
Among other successful businesses, so as a hobby more than anything, he and his wife have a handmade leather shoe making shop here in Hangzhou, I went in because the shoes are beaaaaauuuutiful. And cost a million dollars. But we got talking anyway and I asked if he could help, if he knew of somewhere I could get my skirt mended or where I could buy a needle and thread to do it myself?
I said obviously its not an expensive skirt (there were rips all over it) so I don’t want to spend a lot of money, but just that I couldn’t find anything here in Hangzhou - and plus I looooove this skirt!! They talked it over and his wife bustled off outside. He said she was going to borrow a needle and thread.
She came back and insisted on actually doing it herself!! I said I could - shame when I’d do a crap job in front of the handmade shoe makers of the world haha - but I could! But she wouldn’t hear of it. Man oh man! He said to make myself comfortable so we sat on the sofa talking about dying leather and high heels - “I wouldn’t know if they are uncomfortable! I’ve never worn them myself!!” - hahahaha.
Ended up staying for almost an hour, long after the most lovely person in the world had finished the skirt. Such nice people!! They took a photo and emailed it to me. Not sure why I have a fake smile on because I was in love… If anyone wants AMAZING shoes I have his card :)
